The present invention relates to session management in computer-supported transaction systems.
Computer-based transaction processing is becoming commonplace in ordinary business. Retailers, for example, commonly provide internet supported retail sales systems (“web shops,” informally) to facilitate sales of their goods and services. In such systems, a customer at a browser-supported computer typically interacts with the retailer's computer system to select and purchase a retailer's wares. Communication is supported through a web-based portal; the communication itself is stateless. Accordingly, the retailer's computer system typically stores information regarding the customer's progress through the sales transaction. Because the communication session is stateless, the retailer's system will not be informed if a given customer abandons a transaction and leaves the vendor's web shop.
Computers that support web shops, therefore, can waste processing resources by maintaining sessions active for an inordinate amount of time. Conversely, customers' shopping experiences can be detrimentally affected if the web shops terminate inactive sessions before the customers conclude their transactions with the shops. For example, some retailers may provide services to customers through several independent applications. A customer may continuously request multiple services from a common vendor's. Independent applications in support of such services typically do not operate in an integrated fashion so that extensive activity with one application may cause a second application to time out. Alternatively, when an application times out, some systems require a customer to log completely out of the vendor's system and log back into the system before the customer can regain access to the timed out application. These events also can affect the customer's shopping experience detrimentally.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for a coordinated session management system in computer-support transaction system. Specifically, there is a need for a session management system that tracks timed out applications and permits a customer to regain access to the applications' services without a complete disconnect and reconnect to the system. Additionally, there is a need for a session management system that monitors activity across a plurality of valid sessions and keeps the sessions active so long as a minimum activity level is met with respect to a least one of the applications.